


Welcome to the Future

by RembrandtsWife



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies), Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fix-It, Gen, Stealth Crossover
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-12
Updated: 2014-03-12
Packaged: 2018-01-15 12:08:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 811
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1304359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RembrandtsWife/pseuds/RembrandtsWife
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Khan Noonien Singh is a name feared by all. So was "the Dread Pirate Roberts".</p>
            </blockquote>





	Welcome to the Future

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this shortly after seeing the movie and then lost track of it. I've polished it up and am posting it thanks to adi-mou and some conversation on Tumblr.

"Welcome to the future, Khan Noonien Singh."

The blood was hot again in his veins. Khan moved without thinking from the relaxed position of cryo-sleep to an offensive posture, ready to kill. But the man stooping by his temporary coffin held some sort of weapon in his hand, not a blade or a gun but an energy weapon, and he was surrounded by others whose poised stillness spoke of combat training.

"Where am I? How did I come here?"

The man in the dark clothing stood beside him, without lowering his weapon. "You're in a star system about two hundred light years from Earth, in the twenty-third century of the old Gregorian calendar. Your people are still asleep. Mine, however, are awake." A flicker of amusement crossed the man's cool, composed face. "Surely you remember me, Khan."

Khan wanted to rub his eyes, to chafe his arms, to run his fingers through his hair and stretch and breathe deep. He dared not do any of those things yet.

"How did I come here?"

"Now, that is a very long story." The Englishman--yes, that accent was English, it made Khan want to grind his teeth--offered Khan his hand and hauled him upright with a strength equal to his own.. "You are one man, without a weapon, against seventy-three of your kind, all armed. I suggest you cooperate for the moment and come with me."

Khan saw the wisdom of that. He leaped out of the cryotube and followed the tall Englishman, whose people closed around him without getting too close. He studied them from the corners of his eyes: Some white as only the English could be, others African-dark, some Semitic, even one Indian girl. He kept the anger off his face, focusing on the broad shoulders and long back of his chief captor.

He was taken not to a cell, but to a large, bare dining room. He *was* hungry, and when they offered him water, strong tea, some kind of rations, he saw no reason to demur. The Englishman watched him as he ate, drinking his tea with milk and sugar out of a chipped cup, and suddenly he remembered those silvery slanted eyes, the marble cheekbones, the shark-like smile.

"I see you do remember me." The Englishman's deep voice was almost sly. "Good. It will make things easier." He put down the cup.

"I'm going to tell you a story. You won't believe me at first, but I can show you proof. You and I are three hundred years into our future. I and my people, like you and yours, were cast out, jettisoned into space like so much refuse. For centuries we have drifted, asleep." His mouth twisted. "Like Sleeping Beauty in her tower, awaiting her Prince Charming. But it was no prince who woke me. It was a cowardly weasel who wanted to use me and my people as soldiers in a war with an alien enemy, creatures of another planet. A doddering old fool who called me by *your* name."

His voice was almost hypnotic, even to Khan--slow, measured, with the trained modulations of an actor, the accent of the very best education and breeding. He watched Khan for a moment with those unnerving pale eyes, gauging his audience, before going on.

"I cooperated, on the surface. I studied. I learned. I discovered that, in another timeline, now somehow disrupted, the people of this time had already met you. Fought you, and dishonorably defeated you. Learned to fear you and everyone like you. Like me. The superior ones."

The Englishman sipped his tea, his cool eyes never leaving Khan's face. 

"They used, betrayed, and defeated me, too. Held my people as pawns and used their safety against me. And finally locked me up again, put me back to sleep--until they should be desperate enough to summon 'Khan' to their aid once more."

The long mouth curled back in that terrifying smile. "This time I tricked them. Controlled my metabolism to resist the cryogenic sleep. Escaped from the--warehouse," his voice shook with rage, "where they had stowed us, took my people, and fled to the stars. And then, once we had found a place to live, a base from which to work, I began looking for you. For the real Khan who had terrified them so."

The Englishman leaned forward, his elbows on the table. Impossibly, his smile turned friendly, charming. "It took a whole starship, almost a *fleet* of starships, to defeat me. Just me. Imagine what we could do if we joined forces against them? Your people and mine, khan and raj. You and I." He offered his hand, long fingers unfurled. "What do you say, Khan?"

Khan leaned back in his chair, folding his arms over his chest and smiling in return. "I will certainly consider it, Mr. Holmes."


End file.
